United Democratic Alliance (UDA) Party Strategist Eliud Owalo; who also doubles up as Deputy President William Ruto’s point man in the Nyanza region, has been accused of stealing ideas presented by the latter during his recent meeting with a section of Nyanza leaders.
The DP recently held a meeting with Nyanza leaders in Naivasha where he presented ideas he is keen on implementing for the region if he is elected President in 2022.
However, according to Lake Region Economic Bloc (LREB) CEO Abala Wanga, Owalo allegedly stole the ideas from a project he worked on for the bloc in 2019, when he served as one of its consultants.
Addressing the media in Kisumu on Thursday, Abala said he’ll reach out to Owalo over the issue.
"I was stunned to read through what my friend Eliud Owalo put forth as Ruto's economic ideas for Western and Nyanza regions. We gave him our economic blue print from where he got all the ideas and a lot of information to build the plan," he said.
File image of DP William Ruto and Eliud Owalo. [Photo: Courtesy]
"What he is parading now in public spaces, telling all and sundry that are Ruto's ideas for Western and Nyanza, are all cut and pasted from our documents. He has just lifted everything from the document and we are going to write a letter to restrain him from using our information. This is plagiarism of the highest order," Wanga added.
Reacting to the claims, Owalo termed them as ‘non-sense’ arguing that he is the one that developed the ideas.
"That’s nonsense. I was the consultant for the LREB strategic planning process. I’m the one who developed the LREB strategic plan. How can I copy-paste my own ideas?" Owalo told a local daily.
Owalo, however, did not reveal the nature of his contract with LREB, therefore it is not clear what he and the bloc agreed in terms of property rights.
